


you can do better than me ; but i can't do better than you

by jonphaedrus



Category: Tales of Xillia
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-20
Updated: 2013-11-20
Packaged: 2018-01-02 04:12:07
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1052377
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jonphaedrus/pseuds/jonphaedrus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And he won't ever say no, because he would have waited a lifetime for Jude, even if he'd never had a chance to have him.</p><p>(written to Death Cab for Cutie's <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DJ59-FhJI5c">You Can Do Better Than Me</a>)</p>
            </blockquote>





	you can do better than me ; but i can't do better than you

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rethira](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rethira/gifts).



At first, when Jude was still sixteen and blushed when Alvin made too many forward movements, when he carefully made Alvin wait, just a little longer, when all he wanted to do was pull Jude close and tumble him deep into bed—he had felt awkward. Like a cradle-robber. He watched Jude get older and shared his bed, but never anything else past kisses. He would wake up to Jude's long dark hair, grown now past his shoulders, tangling up against his face. When he got bad, Jude would hold his hand tight and smile, and Alvin would remember that afternoon on the forest floor with blood in his mouth and Jude sitting on top of him with anger in his eyes, but never judgment.

Jude's world-famous. His Spyrite research is half of what is saving Elympios, and every time Alvin goes home, sees the changes that are happening, he realises it's only happening because of Jude and Balan. Jude has talks all over the world, has graduate students that are older than him, and when he turns twenty he misses his birthday celebration because of his research. Elize is upset, but Alvin gets it.

He remains, as he has been. He's a man in his thirties, now, and he runs a transport business with Yurgen. He takes Elize out to do things. He helps out Driselle with her infant, because he's good with kids. He cares for the graves at the Hollowmont, he spars with Gaius when he can't handle the silence any more. He's not famous.

If anybody knows his name, it's only in connection with Jude. He's the secondary, and he gives everything he has. He's been in love with Jude since the moment Jude forgave him.

Jude has somewhere great to go in life. He has a large pair of shoes to live up to. And Alvin will always come second. He knows that. He's going to slip through the cracks of history, him and Leia, while Milla became God, Jude spearheads the greatest scientific discovery ever, Rowen rebuilds a continent, and Elize is trained to step into his shoes when he passes away. Alvin is the excess. He was only ever good before for killing people.

But, for some reason, Jude loves him anyway. And that's enough for him. 

Jude kisses him and takes his hand, and reminds Alvin at night when he dreams of the darkness and of Jill falling, that he's alive. He reminds Alvin that silver hair when he gets older isn't the same as becoming his uncle, dead and buried. Jude laughs and smiles, Jude fits him like nobody else has, Jude is the beginning middle and the end. Alvin didn't live before Jude, not really. He knows he certainly won't live afterward.

He knows he doesn't deserve it. Derrick looks at him with distrust until the end of his life, and Alvin knows it. Leia is never quite comfortable, sometimes, and she never stays alone with him in a room for very long. Jill's dead and in the ground, and he knows it, he has her blood on his hands but he knows it. 

There's a lot that he can't atone for, but he tries anyway. He tries to make the world the kind of place Milla would have liked it to be. He looks after Elize for Rowen once he's dead because he knows that Rowen would have worried constantly about his protégé. He cares for Jude when he mourns his father's passing, even though Alvin doesn't understand why.

He's got blood on his hands, and it's red in his ledger. He marks out a little bit more every year, until his knuckles are arthritic and his face wrinkled and he can't run like he used to. But Jude still laughs at his jokes, Jude still smiles when Alvin comes home from a trip abroad, Jude still goes to bed with him, still loves every inch of his ageing, breaking body.

Alvin could love Jude in a thousand lifetimes, and it would never be enough. Jude is it, Jude is all, Jude is everything. Jude found him and pulled him out of the hell he had come from and taught him how to live again.

Even when they're old, and Jude's hair has gone grey and wispy, wearing his thick reading glasses, when his handwriting shakes and he denies that he needs a cane to walk, Alvin thinks he's the most beautiful thing on the planet. His eyes are the same honey-gold that they were when he was fifteen.

He's a broken old man, and Jude still touches his wrinkled veined fingers with the same sort of deep, unwavering belief that he'll still be there in the morning. Jude still pushes his thinning white hair out of his face, and shifts up to kiss him, doesn't mind the liver spots or the fact that Alvin can't take him to bed the way that he used to.

Jude is too good for him, he knows it. Jude deserves someone good for him. But he has Alvin, and loves him anyway, and—somehow, despite everything, Alvin knows Jude won't leave him. Jude should. Jude won't.

Jude chose not to do better than him, and Alvin never deserved it. But he has it. And he won't ever say no, because he would have waited a lifetime for Jude, even if he'd never had a chance to have him.


End file.
